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Lately, what I have been doing is having conversations with lots of people with whom I work or love about their expectations of themselves. Because, boy, do we expect a lot of ourselves. We expect ourselves to do everything perfectly. The first time. And to do it all efficiently, effortlessly.

“But love is so big, so total, so absolute,” we think. ”And sometimes I don’t really like what I did or what I look like. Doesn’t self-love just give me a way to let myself off the hook over and over again?”

What if I told you that you could only hang out with one friend for the rest of your life?

One friend is all you get to see you through everything—the birth cries and the death cries, the celebrations and the losses, the laughter and the tears.

One friend.

Choose carefully.

And, now, what if I change your understanding of both the rules and the reality of this situation.

What if I tell you that this is really true? Not just a game or a fun dinner time “answer this question” type deal. There really will be just one person that walks alongside you throughout your whole life. There is going to be one person there for everything. And she has already been chosen.

She is you.

Do you treat yourself as well as that friend you chose? Do you give yourself as much self-respect and patience and care as that friend gives you, as you give that friend?

Do you matter to you as much as much you matter to that friend?

Because the truth is—and, look, I know this is a hard truth, I know it is an uncomfortable truth but both those things do not make this any less true- that, in the end, you will be all that you’ve got. But way before that, even, you are the only one who is alway with you. You are the most immediate person you’ve got.

And you should have your own back.

You should believe in you, respect you, care for you, treat yourself well.

You should matter to you.

Because, really, what could be worse than spending the rest of your life with a bully, a mean girl, a troll, an insensitive or disrespectful drag?

I really can’t think of anything.

So, I want you to realize that you are all that you’ve got in any given moment, in every given moment. Let the truth of that shift something in you. Let it bring you home. To you.

We don’t have the kind of time left to keep being mean to ourselves.

We don’t have armored souls that make those barbs not matter.

We don’t have the luxury of doing the type of damage in minutes that will take years, decades, a lifetime to undo.

What we have are these beautiful spirits, longing to be free. And they can’t be free- really free- until they know that they will be safe in the world.

Make your soul that promise. Welcome its authenticity into the world. And then relish in it, make up for lost time, and move forward inspired by your newfound loyalty and reverence.

We’d like to share what we’ve learned with you. So you can do things differently.

The idea behind The Healthy, Happy, Sane Teacher is that with a bit of a time investment up front, your schedule – YOUR LIFE – will feel less overwhelming.

In the same way that long-term – semester or whole year – planning can help guide your academic year with your students, HHST can help you find the you-time during the busiest time of the year.

How?

Just that – long-term planning.

The reality is taking time at the beginning of the year to plan for your health, happiness and sanity can help create a healthier, happier, saner school year and LIFE.

Here’s your chance to change how your school year goes, to start and END the year with enthusiasm and energy. To feel healthy, happy and sane.

Let’s talk logistics of the program.

Once a week phone calls: 60 minutes. The call time doesn’t work for you? That’s ok! We’ll send you the recordings the following day for you to listen when it works for you. Maybe you listen on your morning walk, on your drive to school or on your prep. It’s up to you.

The calls are designed to be fairly philosophical (why we think doing X is important given our experience, the research) and instructive (how to use the tool, what the shades of grey might be with it, and the possible outcomes) and so, while they are live, it is not the discussion that drives them which makes listening live not imperative.

A weekly playbook that arrives in your inbox on Fridays, letting your read them and do the simple but impactful Healthy, Happy, and Sane assignments over the weekend. Many of the exercises take less than 20 minutes. Some can even be done at school or even worked out in your mind during your commute! All of them are designed to be manageable while creating room in your life.

The bottom line is nothing is going to get better unless you do something differently and it would be our honor to work with you if you would like support in making it easier.

The time: Monday morning. The scene: my closet. The problem: what to wear to be on television. The challenge: the transition in weather makes me not want to wear long pants and a long sleeve jacket (my fall and winter professional wardrobe) but my spring wardrobe doesn’t really have anything that’s appropriate for television. The result: one suit, six pairs of pants, and one dress strewn across the closet floor.

After the television segment (where I decided on a flowy, bright colored tunic that I normally wear with blue jeans but instead ultimately wore with black slacks to be more professional), one of the interviewers asked if I was totally fine with my body.

Cue: closet scene.

Click here to read more about how Rosie found her passion and came to peace with her body.

Are you at peace with your body? Do you find yourself worrying about how you look more than you would like? Let us know your thought in the comments section of this post.

At the beginning of Tami’s quest to find the joy in teaching, she went back to school and studied to be a yoga teacher. She figured if nothing else, she could find some inner peace by spending a lot of time on her yoga mat.

She found a whole lot more.

As these things happen, her rigorous yoga teacher training coincided with the beginning of the academic school year and the very long year with a very difficult class. Talk about conflict and stress!

In her post entitled, I Teach, Therefore I Suffer, Tami explores the learning process and holding expectations lightly while simultaneously trying to let go of her über controlling ways.

Just how does one have expectations of themselves as teachers and for their students without getting too caught up in the outcomes?

So this brings us to the question at hand: Is beginning of the school year stress inevitable? Have you found ways to transition from the relative ease of summer to the rigors of a demanding classroom?

Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s take a look at the word resilience.

Back in the fall of 2010, Rosie’s dad experienced some serious health issues that changed her family’s lives. Unexpected complications left everyone at the brink emotionally and through this series of events she she discovered eight steps that helped get her back on track.

In her post Road Map to Resilience, she tells the story and how she discovered those eight steps that helped get her back on track.

If you’ve ever found yourself feeling physically, mentally and emotionally at your end, you will want to check out the post in its entirety.